Information Experience Economy
Friday: June 29, 2007 6:26 AM
Recently, Joseph Pine and I exchanged emails which always make me think beyond the obvious. He and his co-author make you re-think the basic ideas of value creation. While I think I am late to the game with this observation, I will continue with my rendition of it. I am a technologist, and I understand the basic value creation of information and metadata. But I failed to connect the most obvious of ideas with Web 2.0 and the associated technologies..
The raw material of Information Technology is the information itself, data and knowledge. I would add the basic foundation of metadata but many data folks would classify metadata as data but since I am the author… By itself this knowledge is both structured hidden in our systems and databases as well as unstructured held within the enterprise minds of the employees.
The product is the mechanism that this information is delivered to you. This means that the knowledge management systems, repositories, enterprise content management systems, Intranet, and the Internet place information into context. By definition, these containers and associated functions are the product of IT. Great products, that contain information and deliver it in a passive nature, are not enough. We still need the services.
The services include the active utilization of the information held within those containers which include E-commerce, business automation, and application processes. You are taking the passive information held in the containers (products) and then creating value by utilizing processes (services). Other services may add to the usage of that information and even personalize in the sense of preferences.
So, what is the information experience? What can you do with information that can make it personal? What can make information engaging? What can create a unique and sensational experience with information technology? The answer is obvious; Web 2.0 technologies. The relationship between the knowledge creator and the knowledge consumer has blurred. The consumers add vale and in the end, will create five times more value than the original producer. Don Tapscott called them “Prosumers” in his wonderful book “Wikinomics”.
Organizations inside or outside the container e call the organization will need to move beyond the raw material and product line. Think about your own behavior, you will shop at Wal-Mart, cut coupons, and buy generic brands. Then, you go out and spend the lot on a Lexus or vacation in Belize. You see commodities like raw materials and products will compete on price where services and experiences will compete of value. Welcome to the new Information Experience Economy.
Recently, Joseph Pine and I exchanged emails which always make me think beyond the obvious. He and his co-author make you re-think the basic ideas of value creation. While I think I am late to the game with this observation, I will continue with my rendition of it. I am a technologist, and I understand the basic value creation of information and metadata. But I failed to connect the most obvious of ideas with Web 2.0 and the associated technologies..
The raw material of Information Technology is the information itself, data and knowledge. I would add the basic foundation of metadata but many data folks would classify metadata as data but since I am the author… By itself this knowledge is both structured hidden in our systems and databases as well as unstructured held within the enterprise minds of the employees.
The product is the mechanism that this information is delivered to you. This means that the knowledge management systems, repositories, enterprise content management systems, Intranet, and the Internet place information into context. By definition, these containers and associated functions are the product of IT. Great products, that contain information and deliver it in a passive nature, are not enough. We still need the services.
The services include the active utilization of the information held within those containers which include E-commerce, business automation, and application processes. You are taking the passive information held in the containers (products) and then creating value by utilizing processes (services). Other services may add to the usage of that information and even personalize in the sense of preferences.
So, what is the information experience? What can you do with information that can make it personal? What can make information engaging? What can create a unique and sensational experience with information technology? The answer is obvious; Web 2.0 technologies. The relationship between the knowledge creator and the knowledge consumer has blurred. The consumers add vale and in the end, will create five times more value than the original producer. Don Tapscott called them “Prosumers” in his wonderful book “Wikinomics”.
Organizations inside or outside the container e call the organization will need to move beyond the raw material and product line. Think about your own behavior, you will shop at Wal-Mart, cut coupons, and buy generic brands. Then, you go out and spend the lot on a Lexus or vacation in Belize. You see commodities like raw materials and products will compete on price where services and experiences will compete of value. Welcome to the new Information Experience Economy.
Comments (3)
Hello Todd, you present an interesting reasoning. However, I argue that information and knowledge is not something you can manage with technology. What you can manage is content. This content (which can be unstructured or structured = data) can inform and/or create experiences for a user (as a result of cognitive processes), which in turn might lead to knowledge when it is applied in the real world. Information IS in fact personal, since it is a result of cognitive processes. And so are experiences.
A technology or set of technologies cannot create experiences by themselves - there must always be someone (human) that defines and designs content products that aim to inform and/or create experiences. Web 2.0 technologies simply give experience designers more capabilities to create high quality user experiences on the web. Web 2.0 also makes these capabilities available to "common people", which enables them to become producers of content and to share their works with others via social software and other communication technologies.
Posted by: Oscar Berg on June 30, 2007 02:35
Todd, one thing I've always thought key here is understanding that knowledge is experiential information -- learned from experience, applied in experience. While data and information can be managed by technology, knowledge cannot. It exists only in the minds of individuals. (And the next step, of course, mapping to transformations in our Progression of Economic Value is wisdom, required in understanding the true, edifying aspirations of individuals, and how to guide the set of experiences that will help achieve those aspirations.)
When it comes to making information experiential, I heartily recommend Brenda Laurel's book Computers As Theatre. It's priceless, recommending that programmers treat the man-machine connection not as an interface but as a medium -- an experience medium.
Posted by: Joe Pine on June 30, 2007 16:39
In case you missed it, Wikinomics author Don Tapscott is working with Steve Papermaster and nGenera to implement the concepts of the book for Global 2000 companies. http://is.gd/cjx
Posted by: Mike Chapman on May 5, 2008 21:40